Database of Early English Playbooks

Using the Filters

When you first load DEEP, all of the Editions are visible for browsing. As you filter by any of the possible fields, your results will narrow to only those hit by the filter(s). You may filter on one field alone, or on multiple fields in combination using the “AND” and “OR” buttons. When you select “OR”, a box appears around the filters to indicate how DEEP will parse your search in combination with AND: “(x OR y) AND z” returns all records that match either “(x AND z)” or “(y AND z)” but not those that match only “x AND y.”

The checkboxes above the filter box allow you to narrow the universe of records by Record Type.

Select your filter with the drop-down box. When you do so, another box will pop-up below, allowing you either to select the filter term from a second drop-down menu or to enter text freely.

Types of Records

You may choose to search all records in DEEP, or you may search only subsets. DEEP contains three types of records that make up these subsets:

• Single-Play Playbooks make up the great majority of DEEP;
• Collections are books that contain plays, sometimes many (as in the Shakespeare folio), sometimes only a few (as in “small” collections like 1 & 2 Tamburlaine), and sometimes only a single play among non-dramatic texts (as in Sidney's Arcadia);
• Plays in Collection were not published as books themselves, but only as parts of Collections. All searches for Plays in Collection refer only to the information and features contained within the Play in Collection itself, not to those of the Collection in which it appears. Thus, the record for Twelfth Night as it appears in the Shakespeare First Folio does not include any Genre (Title Page), even though the First Folio itself does contain title-page attributions of comedy, tragedy, and history; the record for Epicoene in the Jonson folio of 1616, however, does contain a genre attribution of comedy, since this forms part of the title page of the Play in Collection itself.

Understanding the Filters

DEEP #: numeric search for the unique identifier of every record in DEEP.

BritDrama #: search for the reference number of a play in BritDrama.

Title: free-text search by keyword in modernized spelling, based on BritDrama, Greg, and Annals.

All Title-Page Text (modern spelling): free-text search of modernized transcriptions of all title pages in DEEP.

All Title-Page Text (old spelling): free-text search of original-spelling transcriptions of all title pages in DEEP, based on Greg, ESTC, and EEBO.

Author (Modern): drop-down search of all the authors in DEEP, based on modern attributions of authorship. When an attribution is tentative, the play is attributed to "Anonymous," but with a note on the possible author. Based on BritDrama, supplemented by NOSAC and MiddTxC.

Author (Title Page): drop-down search of all the title-page author attributions in DEEP (even where they may be erroneous according to modern scholarly attributions); attributions have been standardized to full names if any portion of the full name appears on the title page, or to initials if only they appear. Also allows searches for any author attribution or no attribution.

Author (Paratext): as above, but for author attributions that appear in paratexts.

Authorial Status (Title Page): drop-down search, in standardized form, of title-page attributions of some form of elevated status to the author, ranging from “student” to “M.A.” to “Countess,” and so on; also allows searches for any authorial status attribution or no attribution.

Company of First Production (Annals): drop-down search of the professional playing company that initially performed a play, according to Annals, with company names standardized.

Company of First Production (BritDrama): as above, but according to BritDrama.

Company (Title Page): drop-down search of title-page attributions of a professional playing company (even where they may be erroneous according to modern scholarly attributions), with company names standardized based on BritDrama and Gurr 1996. Also allows searches for any company attribution or no attribution.

Theater (Title Page): drop-down search, in standardized form, of title-page attributions of a theater or playing space (even where they may be erroneous according to modern scholarly attributions); all performances “before the king/queen” or “at court” or “at Whitehall” are represented by the attribution “before the Court”; also allows searches for any theater attribution or no attribution, and for indoor or outdoor theater attributions.

Play Type: drop-down search of plays classified by their auspices, e.g., Adult Professional, Boys Professional, Translation, University, Closet/Unacted, and so on; also allows broader searches by Professional or Nonprofessional. Based on BritDrama.

Genre (Annals): drop-down search of play genres, based on the classifications in Annals; these genres are sometimes simplified in the search drop-down (e.g., "History"), but the full genre as listed in Annals will appear in the results display (e.g., "Biblical History").

Genre (BritDrama): as above, but based on classifications in BritDrama.

Genre (Title Page): drop-down search of title-page attributions of genre; also allows searches for any genre attribution or no attribution.

Paratextual Material: drop-down search for the presence of different kinds of paratexts, including Dedication, Commendatory Verses, To the Reader, Argument, Character List, Actor List, Explicit, Errata, and Other Paratexts; also allows searches for any paratext or none. Derived from Greg and EEBO.

Illustration: binary search (yes/no) for the presence of a woodcut or engraving in the playbook, excluding printers' devices, borders, and ornaments.

Black Letter: binary search (yes/no) for whether the main typeface of the playbook is black letter.

Latin on Title Page: binary search (yes/no) for the presence of Latin on the title page of the playbook.

Stationer: combines the searches for Printer, Publisher, and Bookseller (see below). Names standardized and modernized based on STC, volume 3, and Wing, volume 4.

Printer: drop-down search of all the printers of playbooks in DEEP (usually indicated in imprints by “Printed by”); for Single-Play Playbooks and Collections, title-page printer attributions have been supplemented by ascriptions in Greg, STC, Wing, Weiss 1990–2007, and Blayney 2013.

Publisher: drop-down search of all the publishers of playbooks in DEEP (usually indicated in imprints by "Printed for"); this drop-down menu also includes all printers who acted as publishers (imprints indicating the book was “Printed by” one stationer but not “for” another).

Bookseller: drop-down search of all the stationers identified as wholesaling booksellers of playbooks in DEEP (usually indicated in imprints by "to be sold by").

Imprint Location: drop-down search of the locations of bookshops that are named on the title page, according to the map coordinates in STC volume 3. This search is only for those shops that are actually attributed on the title page, not for the locations of any stationers who may be named.

Date of First Production (Annals): date-range search based on the year that the play was first performed (for acted plays) or written (for unacted plays such as closet drama or literary translations), with dates taken from Annals.

Date of First Production (BritDrama): as above, but based on BritDrama.

Date of First Edition: date-range search based on the year that the first edition of a play was published, with dates derived from Greg, STC, Wing, and Blayney 2013.

Format: drop-down search for bibliographic format, based on Greg, STC, and Wing, except that DEEP differs with Greg on large-paper quartos, which Greg calls octavos in quarto format, but which DEEP calls quartos, following Tanselle 2000.

Book edition number: drop-down search for the edition number of a Single-Play Playbook or Collection, or for any reprint ("second-plus") edition. Book edition number does not count editions of plays published in Collections; thus the 1637 quarto of Hamlet is only the fifth edition of the book, even though it is the seventh edition of the play, since Hamlet had previously also been printed twice as a Play in Collection.

Play edition number: as above, but including all printings of the play, both as a Single-Play Playbook and as a Play in Collection; thus the 1637 quarto of Hamlet is the seventh edition of the play according to this filter.

Greg #: searches for the reference number from Greg. Greg indicates works with only a single edition by capitalizing the "A" edition. DEEP ignores this distinction between capital and lower-case A/a in the initial edition of a work, because occasionally DEEP includes additional editions of a work that Greg thought had only a single edition, and because DEEP provides full information about the total number of editions of a work in the Total Editions field.

STC/Wing #: searches for the reference number from STC and Wing.

Year Published: date-range search for the year an edition was published, based on the imprint, except where the imprint date is missing or demonstrably wrong, in which case it is supplied and displayed in square brackets, based on Greg, STC, Wing, and Blayney 2013.

Understanding the Results Views

DEEP offers three different ways to view results. The default is Edition view, which was the only view available in earlier versions of DEEP. In this view, only one record is displayed for each edition hit by a search, even if that edition has multiple variant issues or states or appeared both in collection and as a bibliographically independent playbook. In this way, all the information is made available, without misleadingly inflating the number of editions in the results. In Record view, by contrast, all the records for an edition are displayed, allowing users to see at a glance all the variants of editions hit by a search. Work view treats each play in DEEP as a single title, enabling users to understand how many plays per se fit within a given search criteria, rather than individual editions (with or without their variants) of these plays. Since Works are not associated with any particular year of publication, only the (modern) Author and Title are initially displayed in the brief listing. Expanding any item will display all the editions of that Work published through 1660; these can be clicked to access the full record for that edition in a new tab.

Understanding the Results Display

The Results Display begins with a brief listing of all records matching the search criteria, providing the DEEP #, Year (of publication), Author, and Title. You can re-sort this list by clicking on the header of each column (click again to reverse-sort), and you can expand each record individually or all at once to see full details. The full record display includes Reference Information, Title-Page Features, Paratextual Material, and Stationer Information. In each section, some items will appear only if relevant to the record: if an edition contains no Latin motto on the title page, for instance, that line in the Title-Page Features will not appear at all; or, as another example, if an edition indicates a printer and publisher but not a separate bookseller, the Bookseller line in Stationer Information will not appear.

Reference Information: This section gives the standard bibliographic references from STC, Wing, Greg, and BritDrama, as well as a unique DEEP number. It also gives the record type, play type, genre, dates of first publication and first production, the professional company (if any) that first performed the play and the professional company (if any) attributed on the title page, book and play edition numbers, the total number of editions printed before 1660 (and their formats), the number of leaves it contains, and the format of the edition. This section also indicates if the book is printed in black letter typeface. Finally, this section provides (where applicable) information on a) variant issues and states; b) the relationships between collections and the plays they contain; and c) plays that appear both in collection and as bibliographically independent playbooks designed for individual sale:

Title-Page Features: This section provides an original-spelling transcription of the title page, divided into portions relating to Title, Author, Performance, and Imprint. If applicable, any Latin motto on the title page is transcribed, and any title-page or frontispiece illustrations are described, excluding printers' devices, ornaments, and borders. For Plays in Collection, the Title portion of the transcription is prefixed by the signature of the Play in Collection's title page, head-title (HT), or half-title, and only the material on this page is transcribed (the information on the general title page of the collection being transcribed in the record for the relevant Collection). Our transcriptions record the use of italics (but not black letter), small-caps, superscript, and other display elements, but do not take notice of line breaks, line-end hyphens, the long s, ligatures other than the dipthongs æ and œ, double v for w, turned letters, or borders, ornaments, and devices. Where absolute fidelity to the typography of the title-page is required, users should of course consult the original documents.

Paratextual Material: This section gives information on any paratextual material contained in the edition, including dedications, commendatory verses, addresses to the reader, arguments, character lists (dramatis personae), actor lists, and other paratexts such as errata, advertisements, or illustrations appearing within the book rather than on the title page. For ease of reference, the names of dedicatees are given in standardized and modernized form and thus do not match the precise wording of the dedication itself.

Stationer Information: This section transcribes the colophon, if one appears, and gives the names of the printer, publisher, and bookseller of the edition. For Single-Play Playbooks and Collections, the printer is given even if his or her name does not appear on the title page, if it can be inferred from bibliographic evidence (otherwise "[unknown]" is listed); for Plays in Collection, however, the printer's name is only given if it appears, because the common practice of shared printing makes it unreliable to assume that the printer whose name may appear on the title leaf of the collection printed each play within the collection. This section also gives information about any printed license (imprimatur) and provides information about entries in the Stationers' Registers at any time prior to 1660, even if the entrance is not directly related to the edition in question. Dates of entry are linked to Stationers' Register Online for entries through 1640 (the endpoint for SRO). Finally, this section provides any additional notes on the play.